User Event Signal Plot

NOTE: You can combine the Trace View with other horizontal views by choosing Views > Add > (graph type).

Like in other Tracealyzer plot views, you can adjust the rendering of the plot using Views > User Event Signal Plot.

When the User Event Signal Plot is opened, the Signal Setup dialog (described below) is also opened. The Signal Setup can also be opened from the User Event Signal Plot window menu, under Customize > Signal Setup.

Menu Options

Views Menu	Option	Description
	Add	Add a view to the current view.
	Remove	Remove an existing view from the current view.
	Resize Views To Fit	Resizes all views to fit the current view window.
Resolution Menu	Option	Description
	Very High - 200 High - 100 Medium - 50 Low - 25 Very Low - 10 Single - 1	Determines the number of intervals (data points in a line graph or bars in a bar graph) to display. For a more detailed graph, increase the number of intervals by selecting a higher resolution.
Zoom Menu	Option	Description
	Show Full Trace	Displays the full trace in the current view.
	Zoom In	Zooms in on the current view. To focus on a specific area, click and drag to select an interval.
	Zoom Out	Zooms out of the current view. To focus on a specific area, click and drag to select an interval.
Customize Menu	Option	Description
	Show Filters/Legends	Toggles view of the actor view filters and legend.
	Show Tool Panel	Toggles display of the Tool Panel.
Display Options	Description
	Various options for customizing the display of the current view. Each view contains its own Display Options icon (shown at left are the display options for the CPU Load Graph view) . Note that the options available from this menu will vary depending on the graph/view.

Time Region

A gray rectangular outline indicates the time region that is currently displayed by the Trace View. As the Trace View zooms in and out, this rectangle updates dynamically to mark the current region.

 

Signal Setup

The Signal Setup window appears when the User Event Signal Plot window is opened. This dialog allows you to create signals for plotting user events data. A signal is essentially a filter that is applied on all user event strings to extract the values to plot, in the form of a regular expression and some related settings. Two signals are predefined, intended for use with the included demo trace, but you can edit or delete them as needed.

Templates are provided that are easy to import and adaptable. Note that all changes made are stored on disk automatically.

The Signal Setup dialog displays all of your signals in a list view. You can manage your signals using these options:

• New – creates a new "empty" signal.
• Copy – creates a copy of the selected signal.
• Import – import a set of signals from an XML file generated by the Export feature.
• Export – save your signals in a specified file. This simply creates a copy of the internal file that stores the signal setup.
• Delete – deletes the selected signal

Use the Signal Editor, located in the upper right of the Signal Setup dialog, to edit the selected channel.

• Name –the signal name shown in the User Event Signal Plot window.
• Regex Pattern – a regular expression used to extract the value to plot from the user event labels. To limit the plot to a specific User Event Channel, start the expression with the User Event Channel Name in brackets. For example, this expression matches all events on User Event Channel "SinWave" that contains a message like "Value: [number]".

  \[SinWave\].*Value\:[ ]*(-?[0-9]+)

  Regular expressions use the .NET Framework regular expression engine, which is Perl 5 compatible. If you are unfamiliar with regular expressions, there are plenty of tutorials available at http://www.zytrax.com/tech/web/regex.htm.
• Use Template – opens a new dialog with general templates that can be imported (see Signal Templates below).
• Result Index – the regular expression may produce a group of results. This value allows you to select the right result from the regular expression by setting the result list index. To study what results a certain regular expression generates, use the Signal Tester explained below.
• Parse Match As – choose whether to interpret the resulting value as a decimal integer, a hexademimal integer or a double-precision floating point value.
• Presentation Color – click on the colored button to select the color of this signal in the User Event Signal Plot view.
• Save as Template – stores the currently selected signal as a signal template for future use (see Signal Templates, below).
• Auto Update – determines whether the settings should be applied and saved automatically when changed. If this is unchecked, you need to use the Update button to save your changes.
• Update – saves and applies any changes to the currently selected signal. This is disabled when Auto Update is enabled (default). Clear the selection for Auto Update to enable this button.

Use the Signal Tester, located in the lower right of the Signal Setup dialog, to test the selected signal using example data. Signal Tester contains three fields:

• Example Data – enter any text in the text field to use as example input to the regular expression in the current signal setup. You may also click on the Example Data label to open a list of all user events in the trace, where you can select a user event to use as example data.
• Groups – a regular expression may give multiple results. This shown all results produced by the current regular expression on the example data. Use Result Index in the Signal Editor to select what result to use. The first result has index 0.
• Resulting Value – the value that will be plotted based on the current signal and the example data.

If the signal setup is incorrect for some reason, the specific input field turns red.

If you close this window, it can be opened again from the User Event Signal Plot window menu, under Customize > Signal Setup.

Signal Templates

You can load and save signal setups as templates for future use using the Use Template and Save as Template options. Both options open the Signal Templates dialog that displays the templates available in a grid view. The grid view contains one line per template, with the same properties as in the editor, except that color is not a part of the template and there is also an extra field for a description of the template.

NOTE: The name field is the template name, not the signal name, so this is not copied to the Signal Editor when applying the template.

The Signal Templates dialog contains these options:

• Reset Templates – restores the original templates, removing any user changes.
• Delete Selected – deletes the selected template.
• Apply Selected – applies the template to the Signal Setup Editor (on the currently selected signal setup).

To create a new template:

To create a new template, edit the empty line at the bottom of the grid view, and then press Enter. If there is an error in the template, the Resulting Value cell of the affected row will turn red.

To edit an existing template:

Edit the fields corresponding to that template directly in the grid view. When you edit a template, the changes are automatically evaluated using the example data and the result is then shown in the Resulting Value column.